There has been a lot of dissatisfaction expressed in recent months, on the site and in e-mails to the moderators, regarding irrelevant/off-topic comments. It’s also important that Brock provides a place for people to express their thoughts. To strike a balance, we have installed a “move comment” function, with which we can move a comment to a different thread.
This should help keep things more focused while, at the same time, the person’s comment still appears on the site and discussion can ensue without overwhelming the original, unrelated, thread.
Moving a comment from one thread to another keeps both threads more useful to persons seeking help or information or simply having a coherent discussion on a topic.
We do not intend to eliminate thread drift from the site, just to keep certain threads focused, such as a post that deals with a project or a post focused on a specific type of information but someone posts a comment way off-topic; say, consulate problems on the FATCA thread.
Many topics overlap a lot, so don’t expect perfection — and every one of us undoubtedly has a different sense of just where “on-topic” ends and “off-topic” begins (can’t please everyone all of the time), so you may still see some comments you feel are out of place but to a lesser degree.
Thread drift is inevitable on a site that values sharing of ideas and opinions. It can be pesky and annoying, but sometimes it’s a good thing which expands discussion; and exchanging thoughts is important part of the Brock community. We don’t want to quench that! But this should keep parts of the site on target.
I would also like there to be a Renunciation thread (and also one for Tax questions). And I like EmBee’s suggestion to create a new Part when the thread gets too long.
I’ve been doing this with the Media and Blogs thread (now on Part 6 of 6). Every New Year’s Day, I close the old Part and start a new Part (with links to previous Parts).
A suggestion if there is a new Renunciation thread: Close it and start a new Part when it gets to 1000 (or some number) comments or do this once a year. If there’s an active discussion going on, either (1) wait a couple of days and do this when there’s a lull in conversation; or (2) copy/move the in-progress discussion comments to the new Part.
Meanwhile, since we are now able to copy comments, I will be creating a page with copies of Renunciation questions and answer comments that appear anywhere on the site. (I haven’t done this yet, as I haven’t seen any renunciation questions since the Renunciation thread was closed.)
@ pacifica777
That sounds good. 🙂
If you want to help new visitors with their OMG moments, leverage your hard-earned search engine status and direct them to an appropriate destination, for instance a dedicated Q and A thread. Based on the first few attempts, the Brock Pub is likely to disappoint – it’s either current political arguments (e.g. Warren), or weird off-topic stuff (e.g. Japanese postal money orders) or who knows what (e.g Jordan Peterson mentions). As likely to scare people away as to offer them assistance.
@calgary
I thought the Brock pub thread was created to take all the incidental /extraneous chat away from the important informative posts.
Em is right that an important and satisfying part of Brock is helping guide people away from the condors. Can a renunciation part 3 thread be created as other threads have been split?
@Pacifica777
Thanks for that, that sounds great.
Sorry I posted my point before I saw yours. I am a slow typist!
I hate to nitpick. Why not simply go back to
Relinquishment and Renunciation of US Citizenship
Start part 3 if it helps. Wouldn’t this be the best solution.?
There are now 3 links in the side bar under “Ask your questions about” and all three lead to threads where comments are closed. I think that opening new threads annually, just like the Media articles thread is a great idea. The pub posts so far have been opened and closed so quickly that a meaningful conversation with someone trying to figure out what to do is impossible. The conversations in the renunciation thread often took months as people worked through the process. I think the pub posts serve a purpose. But don’t throw the baby out with the bath water. The renunciation thread in particular has been a major source of value here. And, now that you can move comments, the off-topic diversions can be moved to the current pub thread (or wherever they fit best).